


A Study Date

by thealpacalypse, timetobegin



Series: George Squared Sleepover Fluff [6]
Category: Call Me Katie (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, SUCH FLUFF, george squared
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-26
Updated: 2017-01-26
Packaged: 2018-09-20 01:12:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9468812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thealpacalypse/pseuds/thealpacalypse, https://archiveofourown.org/users/timetobegin/pseuds/timetobegin
Summary: Gleeson goes over to Bates's for a study date, where surprisingly, they actually spend some of their time studying. But much more time is spent with kissing, strawberries, films, blanket forts, and talking about things instead of angsting about them.Part 6 of Bibbsch's George Squared Sleepover Fluff series.





	

Bates greets him with a grin and a kiss when he opens the door, and Gleeson can’t help the light, fluttery feeling in his chest. At some point maybe this won’t feel as great as it does, but getting to date his best friend and show his feelings on a regular (always) basis is _wonderful._ So wonderful that he doesn’t want to pull away until they’re almost at the ‘aggressive make out’ stage and Gleeson’s still standing in the hallway.

 

“Aren’t you going to invite me in?” he asks, resting his forehead against Bates’s.

 

Bates pulls away and sticks his tongue out before pretending to be polite. “Come in, honored guest. May I take your bag, sir?” He stands as straight as he can manage and formally extends his arm with a bow.

 

Gleeson can’t help it, he bursts out laughing as he closes the door. “You’re ridiculous.” He feels an ‘I love you’ just below the surface, but it’s too soon. Sure, they’ve been friends for nearly a decade, but they’ve only been dating thirteen days. (Not that anyone’s counting.)

 

Bates just sticks out his tongue again.

 

“Very mature.”

 

Bates huffs out a mock offended sigh. “If you’re done criticizing me. Mum and Jason are away for a couple of days, so we can set up anywhere, but all my crap’s in my room so would you mind working up there?”

 

“Nope.”

 

Gleeson lets Bates lead the way to his room while Gleeson sneaks a box into the fridge for later.

 

Gleeson loves Bates’s room. They can turn on the TV for background noise (or distraction, depending on their levels of desperation), they can sit on the bed or on the remarkably comfy carpet surrounded by pillows, and there’s never any need for noise cancelling headphones.

 

He drops his bag on the ground and himself onto Bates’s bed with a sigh.

 

“What’s up?” Bates asks, brow furrowing as he sits down next to Gleeson.

 

“Nothing, I’m just really glad to be here, is all.”

 

“Were your parents fighting again?”

 

“Is water wet?” Gleeson responds, surprising even himself with the bitterness of his voice. “Yeah, they were going at it a bit when I got home to grab my stuff. Thanks for inviting me over, because if you hadn’t I’d probably have just shown up.”

 

“Well, you know that’s always ok too.”

 

“Yeah, I know.”

 

Bates clearly wants him to talk more about it, but holds back because Gleeson never really wants to talk about it. Talking about it won’t make his parents not hate each other, and it just ruins the time he spends with Bates. So with Bates’s concerned eyes following him, he pulls out a textbook and his notes, and after a beat, Bates does the same.

 

Their go to method for studying for history exams is to just talk through everything, because telling it like it’s a story helps both of them remember everything. One of them always ends up saying something at some point that has them both doubling up with laughter, which aside from being a lot of fun also helps make the facts stick. Gleeson thinks for a minute that maybe they should film and cut together the best bits for a vlog, but with everything being so shit with Katie and Peter, he’d feel weird posting such a lighthearted video. Plus, that would be _way_ too productive. They just made a video the day before, after all.

 

After talking through everything to do with World War I for an hour or two, Bates declares a study break.

 

“My brain is about to squeeze out my ears and the test isn’t until Monday anyway,” is Bates’s response to all of Gleeson’s protests.

 

“You know if you go to uni you might have to study for more than ninety minutes at a time.”

 

Bates ignores this and plunks down three game boxes on his bed.

 

“This is going to be some study break,” Gleeson jokes. “Wait, Settlers of Catan? Bates have you lost your mind? You can’t play that with two people.”

 

“Oh, I know,” he says lightly and grins, then plunks his chess board down on top of the boxes, using them as a table. Gleeson grins in response, though he knows this means their study break will carry on for a while.

 

Of all the things they nerd out about together, chess is one of the biggest (and the weirdest, according to their other friends). They learned together when they were eleven or twelve then spent the years getting better mostly playing each other. Gleeson and Bates are quite ridiculous about it, spending minutes at a time debating moves and trying to one up one another.

 

At one point Bates takes such a long turn that Gleeson goes to the bathroom and comes back to Bates sitting in the exact same position, chin resting in his hand and staring intently at the board. It’s so cute that Gleeson snaps a picture and posts it on their Instagram.

 

At the phone camera sound effect, Bates looks up and smiles so adorably that Gleeson takes another photo, but he keeps that one to himself.

 

\--

 

Forty minutes later, their game done, Gleeson stands and stretches. “You hungry?”

 

“As though you even have to ask.”

 

“I’ve got a surprise for you.”

 

Bates quirks an eyebrow. “Food related surprises are always good in my book.”

 

Without much ceremony, Gleeson leads the way to the fridge and pulls out the box, handing it to Bates. He opens it and his jaw drops.

 

“George Gleeson, I think these might be the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.”  


The night before, in a fit of boredom and inspiration, Gleeson made strawberries dipped in chocolate. But he hadn’t stopped there. He looked up a YouTube video for how to make them look super fancy, and drizzled them in chocolate in crisscross patterns using a spoon. He practiced a lot on his hands until he got it right, so he could eat his mistakes without running out of strawberries.

 

This time it’s Bates who takes a picture, not of Gleeson, but of the fruit. He pulls them out of the box still on the wax paper and sets them on the table, careful not to screw them up. Then he takes as cool and as artsy of a picture as his phone can manage and posts it online. Gleeson watches, giggling a bit at his meticulousness, but Bates only says, “Seriously, G, these are insane. The world has to know about them.”

 

Bates is about to pick one up when he says, “Gleeson, I think we need to frame these and put them in a museum. I can’t destroy them, no matter how delicious they look.”

 

“Then let me, I don’t mind at all. You’ve already preserved my work for posterity.” He picks one up and takes a bite, offering the other half to Bates. He expects Bates to just take it out of his hand, but Bates just leans forward and finishes it off, his lips barely brushing Gleeson’s fingertips. Gleeson can’t suppress a shiver.

 

(Gleeson considers briefly that Katie and Peter would be absolutely revolted. He doesn’t mind in the slightest.)

 

Bates gets a funny, soft look in his eyes, followed by determination. “Hey G,” he says, with a sort of rehearsed casual tone, like he’d practiced it, “do you want to sleep over?” His eyes are intense, and they don’t match his voice at all.

 

Gleeson feels his heart start to pound, and he has to look away. Yes, he wants to say yes, but he feels stupidly nervous about it. There’s no reason for it. He and Bates have had plenty of sleepovers in their years of friendship.

 

The last one didn’t go so well, but Gleeson prefers not to think about it.

 

“What about your mum?” he asks softly. That’s the safest bet. There’s no way she would be cool with him staying the night, and it saves him from maybe having to say no.

 

“She’s okay with it. So, what do you say?”

 

That was the last response Gleeson expected to hear, and it momentarily drives out the churning in his stomach, and he finds he can look up at Bates again. “Wait, what?”

 

Bates is grinning with relief, trump card played and convinced that Gleeson’s main protest has been swept aside. “I guarantee you, it’s cool. Don’t worry.”

 

“So she actually said the words, ‘Yes, my son, you can have your boyfriend spend the night’?”

 

Bates snorts. “Well, no, because nobody actually talks like that.”

 

“Bates…” Gleeson says warningly.

 

“Stop worrying. I’ve got it all figured out.” He leans back in his chair and spreads his hands like he’s some kind of crime boss. It’s so hilarious that Gleeson almost forgets to be worried, but since there are two things bothering him, he can’t let _both_ of them just _go_.

 

“She doesn’t know, does she?”

 

Bates rolls his eyes. “No, G, listen. She and Jason are away for a few days at a conference, and they left me alone in the house, _and_ mum didn’t forbid me from inviting you over.”

 

Bates says it like this answers all their problems, but Gleeson fails to see what there is to be so happy about. “Yeah, so?”

 

Bates rolls his eyes, still smiling. “Don’t you get it? She could have easily told me ‘no having people over’ or ‘no inviting your boyfriend to stay the night’, but she didn’t. Seriously, you’ve known me forever, when has my mum been shy about telling me what I can’t do?”

 

“I guess, but…”

 

“Look, since I came out to her, my mum and I have done a lot of talking. Like, real talking.”

 

 _This_ gets Gleeson’s attention. Bates’s relationship with his mum has always been a bit strained, and though Gleeson knows Bates loves her, he also knows Bates doesn’t share much with her as a general rule.

 

“I was scared to come out to her, but I didn’t want to keep it from her for obvious reasons.”

 

Gleeson raises an eyebrow. “Like what?”

 

“Like, I live with her and she’s my mum and I wanted to ask you out, and there was no way I was hiding _that_ from her. I am masterful at deception, but I’m not that good.”

 

Gleeson knows this is important, and he should really be paying attention, but his heart races at the idea that Bates was planning to kiss him since coming out. Like, intellectually he knows that, but hearing Bates say it out loud is another matter entirely.

 

Bates pauses, looking weirdly at Gleeson, and Gleeson realizes he has a big, stupid smile on his face. “Sorry, I know this is really serious, but you… You said you wanted to ask me out.”

 

Bates grins wide enough to show his missing teeth and closes the space between them. When he pulls away, he says, “You’re really dumb sometimes, you know that?”

 

“You’re really mean sometimes,” Gleeson shoots back, but there’s no heat behind it.

 

“ _Anyway,_ I’d like to get back to the serious conversation we were having if you don’t mind.”

 

“Not at all,” Gleeson teases, then gets back into Serious Mode before Bates can smush a strawberry in his face. One look from Bates has Gleeson thinking Bates might do that anyway, but then he huffs out a sigh and keeps talking.

 

“I also didn’t want to keep it from her because she’s my mum, and I wanted her to know. I didn’t think Jason would take it as badly as she would, either, so I figured I wouldn’t actually get thrown out of the house. But also like, I shouldn’t have to be afraid to tell her something like this.”

 

Gleeson’s heart squeezes in his chest. Even though he knows things are better now, he hates that Bates ever had to deal with that. “No, you shouldn’t.”

 

Bates manages a grim smile. “Yeah, but she’s said really shitty homophobic things to me before, and I had no way of knowing whether that’s what she really thought or… whatever. So I was scared. I didn’t think she’d react well.

 

“But the worst part for her was that I was so nervous. We talked a bit about the stuff she’s said to me growing up, especially about you, and how I’ve reacted to how strict she’s been. She said she was sorry, and that she’d try to trust me more from now on, so that I could trust her more, too.”

 

“Wow.”

 

“Yeah, so she’s been letting me do my own thing more, and I’ve been telling her more about what I’m up to. It’s weird, but it’s nice.”

 

“That’s great,” Gleeson replies, and he really means it. “I’m really happy for you, Bates.”

 

“Thanks. And as an added bonus, it means I get to have you over without feeling guilty about it. Her and Jason going away this weekend feels like a big test run.”

 

“But you didn’t actually ask your mum if I could stay.”

 

“No, but it’s all part of the thing.”

 

Gleeson decides to just accept this. If Bates isn’t worried, he won’t either.

 

Not about Bates’s mum, anyway.

 

Still wanting to stall for time, Gleeson asks, “So why didn’t you ask me before I came over?”

 

“It just,” Bates shrugs and struggles for words. “It felt like a big deal? Even though I don’t want it to be, you know?”

 

The idea that Bates is also nervous calms Gleeson down a bit, but not much. It’s _Bates_ , for crying out loud, there’s no need for Gleeson to be this tense. Ridiculous.

 

“I was also worried you’d say no, and then you wouldn’t have come over at all.”

 

“What? Why would I do that?”

 

“I don’t know, I was worried that maybe you’d think there was other stuff I wanted besides just spending time with you, and… I don’t know.” Bates scratches at the back of his neck, cheeks coloring. And Gleeson has to smile, despite his nerves, despite everything.

 

“Other stuff? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?” Gleeson is used to this, dealing with his emotions by focusing on the positive. Like how adorable embarrassed Bates is.

 

“Oh, shut up. Don’t pretend you wouldn’t have overthought it.”

 

 _I’m overthinking it now,_ Gleeson thinks, but decides it’s best to keep up his nonchalance for the moment. Maybe it’ll give him the courage to say yes.

 

“Gleeson?”

 

“What?”

 

“You still haven’t answered my question.”

 

So much for nonchalant. The churning in his stomach has migrated to his throat, so his voice is soft when he says, “Okay.” Soft, but completely audible in the silent, empty flat.

 

He’s rewarded with Bates’s giant grin.

 

“Great. Now that that’s sorted, making out or blanket fort?”

 

Gleeson tries to hide his smile as he pretends to think about it, then says, “Both? Both is good,” and pulls Bates towards him.

 

They (eventually) get the blanket fort made in the living room, where they never got to hang out as kids. It’s very structurally complicated, constructed to accommodate the TV, the couch, and as much floor space as possible. As they’re piling all the pillows they can find in the house on the floor, Gleeson feels this wonderful warmth and simple happiness, almost as though they’re eight again, brand new best friends where their biggest problem is figuring out which movie to watch and making sure they can adequately rot their teeth with the amount of junk food they have assembled. And, of course, deciding on pizza toppings.

 

Except there’s a _lot_ more kissing involved.

 

Thanks to Gleeson’s comment, they obviously have to watch _The Road to El Dorado_ , which was one of their favorite movies when they were younger and neither of them has seen it in forever. They spend the opening of the movie finishing off the strawberries and gathering evidence that Miguel and Tulio are, in fact, in love with one another (a quick Tumblr search proves the internet generally agrees), and the next third butchering the song lyrics and bursting out laughing at all the jokes that are not _remotely_ appropriate for children.

 

“I’m telling you, Chel was nowhere _near_ his mouth!” Bates shouts. Gleeson would tell him to quiet down, but there’s no one in the flat to yell at them.

 

“And I’m telling you that you have a dirty mind,” Gleeson responds, reaching for another slice of pizza.

 

“Don’t you know it,” Bates says, waggling his eyebrows absurdly. The whole thing is ridiculous and Gleeson knows he should be laughing because it _is_ funny, but he still has some residual nerves that he doesn’t know what to do with, so all he can manage is a kind of forced chuckle. When Bates’s face falls, Gleeson wishes more than anything that he could have hidden it behind a smile, like he usually does.

 

Bates pushes himself into a sitting position. “G, are you okay?” His eyes are filled with concern and hurt and guilt.

 

Gleeson swallows then replies, “I’m fine,” knowing full well Bates won’t believe it.

 

“You _know_ I don’t, like… expect anything, don’t you?”

 

Gleeson wasn’t exactly sure what he was so afraid of, but that seemed as close an answer as anything.

 

“George, look at me. Please.”

 

They only call one another George when the situation really demands it, otherwise it gets too confusing. When Bates came out, when Gleeson first talked about how much his parents were fighting. So Gleeson has to look.

 

“I just wanted to spend time with you, that’s it. Without nosy friends or parents looming over our shoulders.”

 

The way he says looming, drawing out the ‘oo’, makes Gleeson laugh, and he feels himself start to relax a bit more. Funny how talking about things usually works better than bottling them up. (Talking about things instead of angsting about them.) Gleeson takes a deep breath and sighs it out, forcing the tension out of his body. (It even works. Mostly.) “Thanks. I have no idea why this is getting to me so much.”

 

“It’s okay. We’re not going to do anything you don’t want to do.”

 

Gleeson has to look away when he says quietly, “It’s not that I don’t want to.” Next to him, not two feet away, Bates has grown very quiet, but Gleeson can’t meet his eyes. He stares very intently at the pillow in his lap, blush rising in his cheeks. They’ve never been so…direct before, and it feels weird because this new thing between them feels so different and so natural at the same time. The feeling that he can talk to Bates about anything is warring with the fact that they’ve only been officially dating for a couple weeks.

 

It takes a while for Bates to respond. “Hey, well, it’s not like I’ve ever done this before, either.”

 

Suddenly, the noise level from the TV grows and they both jerk their heads up to it, startled. The calming music ended and the ball game is starting.

 

Gleeson is ready to just laugh it off or ignore it and watch the movie, but Bates looks over at him and smiles.

 

“Let’s just figure this out one step at a time, okay? Right now, I want to finish watching this ridiculous movie with my boyfriend.” And with that, Bates levers himself back onto the ground and they watch Miguel and Tulio cheat to win the game.

 

It’s been so long since Gleeson’s seen the movie that he’s forgotten all about “Friends Never Say Goodbye”, one of the saddest songs on the face of the planet. Gleeson can actually feel tears pricking at his eyes, both because he’s so invested, and because naturally he’s imagining fighting with Bates like that. Remembering how horrible he felt at two in the morning the last time he slept over here, confused and heartsick and overwhelmingly guilty.

 

They’re sitting shoulder to shoulder on the floor now, using the couch as a backrest, so Gleeson takes the opportunity to twine his fingers through Bates’s and lays his head on his shoulder. Since Gleeson’s taller, they usually do this the other way round, but when Bates leans his head down to rest on Gleeson’s and squeezes his hand, it still feels right.

 

\--

 

“So they’re all dating, right?”

 

“Oh yeah, definitely.”

 

They’ve just watched Chel, Miguel, and Tulio ride off into the sunset (well, Chel rode, the boys ran), with no gold and no plan, nothing but an open future. Sometimes Gleeson wishes he could just charge of into the future like that, just set out with no idea where he was going. Bates was much better at that kind of thing.

 

“I can’t believe this movie ends in polyamory,” Bates says as he gets to his feet and stretches, then collapsing back onto the couch. “This is the best movie ever.”

 

Gleeson can feel himself smiling as he rolls his eyes. “You say that about every film we watch.” Not even bothering to stand, Gleeson pulls himself up next to Bates on the sofa.

 

Bates looks over-the-top offended, a specialty of his. Open mouth, hand on chest, the dictionary definition of ‘taken aback’. “That is _not_ true!”

 

“Name one.”

 

“You made me watch _Requiem for a Dream_ that one time, and that movie was super trippy and weird.”

 

This is an old argument. “But the soundtrack is incredible!”

 

“I’m not a crazy music buff like you, good music does not a good movie make.” He scrunches his nose and makes a kind of “nyeh” noise in the most adorable way, and Gleeson has an even harder time taking him seriously. “You didn’t like it either.”

 

“Fine. But I’m going to start keeping track of how often you say something is the ‘best ever.’”

 

“You do that.” Then Bates leans in and kisses him slowly.

 

Despite their talk, and despite the fact that they’ve made out a bunch of times already, Gleeson is still nervous about the whole staying the night thing. It makes every affectionate gesture feel like a part of something bigger, even when it’s not. So he pulls away after a few seconds and says, “I have a very important question for you.”

 

Bates looks puzzled.

 

“Who’s Miguel, and who’s Tulio?”

 

Bates’s grin is back. They each point to themselves.

 

“Miguel,” Bates says decisively, just as Gleeson says “Tulio” at the exact same time.

 

Then they burst out laughing.

 

“Of course, of _course_. As though it’s even a question.” Bates kisses Gleeson on the nose. “Though you’re much less of a greedy jackass, I’d have to say.”

 

“Hey, he comes through in the end.”

 

“True.” Bates leans back, considering. “How have we never thought to cast ourselves as dynamic duos before?”

 

“I dunno. Who else is there?”

 

“Well the first one that comes to mind is Timon and Pumba from _The Lion King_ , but since I’m _definitely_ Pumba I’d rather just skip on over that one…”

 

Gleeson doubles over with giggles because he can’t argue. “He could clear the savannah after every meal…” he sings.

 

“Hey!” Bates whips him in the face with one of the pillows from the floor, and the ceiling of their blanket fort trembles slightly.

 

“Careful, you’ll ruin our castle!”

 

“You’re just saying that so I don’t hit you again.”

 

“Why can’t it be both?”

 

“Both is good,” Bates grins, and kisses Gleeson again, a quick one this time. “So, does this mean we’re watching _The Lion King_? Because I am so here for that.”

 

Gleeson pulls Bates’s wrist towards him to see the time. “Yeah, it’s not too late.”

 

“You know you could just get a watch.”

 

“Yeah, but then what would I need you for?”

 

Bates stick out his tongue and says, “Wait, not too late? You’re not planning on going to school tomorrow are you? It’s an athletics carnival!”

 

“Bates, I’m an athlete.”

 

“Yeah but you’re not doing anything so why go?”

 

“In support of my peers! Plus, I think they’re fun.”

 

“C’mon, please?” He makes puppy dog eyes that rival that of Miguel’s. “We can stay up late, swapping manly stories, and in the morning I’ll make waffles? Or, pancakes. We don’t have a waffle maker.”

 

“Leslie Knope would be so disappointed.”

 

“I know, I have to live with it every day.” He pokes Gleeson in the side. “G, please.”

 

“I’m already staying over, what more do you want?”

 

“To cuddle with you in the morning and not have to go to school.”

 

Honestly, that sounds pretty dang amazing, even if Gleeson has never missed an athletics carnival before. “Okay, fine, we’ll see in the morning.”

 

“Yes!” Bates thrusts his fist in the air then carefully exits their fort to find the movie.

 

\--

 

It’s weird but wonderful to be splayed out on the floor in Bates’s living room, with no parents to come by and tell them they’re singing or laughing too loud (though in a fit of consideration every once in a while they shush one another on the neighbors’ behalf) or to go to sleep already and stop drinking sugary caffeinated soda. They’ve watched _Lion King_ and a bunch of episodes of _Parks and Rec_ (after determining they can’t really decide which one of them is Leslie or Ben) before they even really consider going to bed, then when the yawns start coming thick and fast they watch one more episode for good measure before heading to Bates’s room.

 

“I’m just saying, I’d happily listen to weird banjo music for hours on a road trip,” Bates says. “Like, I get that it was awkward and full of sexual tension or whatever, but I really love banjo.”

 

“So maybe instead of Leslie, you’re Chris Traeger.”

 

Bates cocks his head to the side. “I can’t tell whether to be extremely pleased or insulted.”

 

“He is ridiculously attractive.”

 

“Yeah, but he’s also a bit nuts? And if anyone in this relationship has the lock on positivity so extreme it should be an Olympic event, that’s you, my friend.”

 

“Fair enough.”

 

Bates comes back from the bathroom with a new toothbrush still in the package. “Here, use an actually clean toothbrush instead of your old one from six years ago.”

 

“Did you finally throw that one away?”

 

“I gave it a proper sendoff. The ceremony was beautiful, it’s a shame you had to miss it.”

 

They brush their teeth shoulder to shoulder, grinning at one another in the mirror like they did when they were kids.

 

Bates gets Gleeson a t-shirt and leaves him in the bathroom to finish getting ready for bed, and when Gleeson comes into the room the guest mattress is all set up, but Bates is sitting on his own bed, looking at him with cautious hope.

 

Gleeson’s heart squeezes in his chest, wondering how in the world he got to be this lucky. Wondering how many boys would have pressured him to do something he maybe wasn’t comfortable with. How many boys would expect something like it was owed, instead of hope for it. And that, once and for all, chases most of the nerves from his stomach, and ignites a feeling of a very different sort there, though he’s too tired to puzzle it out.

 

Very deliberately, Gleeson steps around the guest mattress and sits next to Bates, beginning the somewhat lengthy process of taking off his legs. Once that’s done, he leans in and kisses Bates, who’s smiling. Not his full blown grin, but the softer one he had on his face before their first kiss.

 

This time, it’s Bates who pulls away before things get too heated. Whether it’s for Gleeson’s comfort or his own, Gleeson doesn’t know, but he doesn’t push.

 

Somewhat awkwardly, they lie down, and for a few moments they don’t know what to do with themselves. But since Gleeson usually sleeps on his back and Bates on his side, Bates finally just curls into Gleeson with his head resting on his shoulder. Gleeson reaches over and turns out the bedside light.

 

It’s a strange sensation, but as Gleeson curls his right arm around Bates’s shoulders, he can _feel_ his comfort zone expanding to include Bates snuggled into his side. He thought it might take him a while to fall asleep, but he’s so comfortable that he can already feel oblivion pulling on his eyelids.

 

“G’night, Bates.”

 

“Night, G,” comes the muffled reply, buried in Gleeson’s shirt and already thick with sleep.

 

And Gleeson drifts off, arm going happily numb and the feeling of George Bates’s hair on his cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> Here it is, the long promised canon inspired George Squared sleepover! Brought to you with the kick in the pants that was the angst we're getting from this new series. Endless thanks to my best sounding board, lovely beta, and wonderful friend Balthy/Bibbsch, without whom's amazing, adorable fics this one wouldn't exist. I hope this brings you some comfort in these trying times. 
> 
> Comments are chocolate covered strawberries and Gleeson's laugh :D


End file.
